A tired old world, too busy to think that things could ever be any different, it would be too difficult to change direction.
And then something new comes along and the world is shown to be so much more than we thought, not a dead end or a prison, but the beginning of something, the beginning of something wonderful, something surprising.
Like bread and wine that end up being more than food and drink, the very body
and blood of God.
What is the Gospel?
We all should know that the word gospel means good news, so what is the good news?
Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say who.
Who is the Good News?
For Christians, obviously, the Good News is the person of Jesus, his life, his teachings, his death and his resurrection.
Why is he good news?
What does Jesus bring to the world that breaks us out of our inertia and malaise, that brings hope despite the facts, love against all odds and faith in the midst of deception and betrayal?
And the answer once again isn’t what but who.
Jesus is who is brought to the world that the world becomes the bearer of hidden things, a great treasure leavening the flour of the world that the world becomes the bread of the kingdom of heaven.
How do we talk about such things? How do we talk of the person that transfigures the world as we know it into something that we don’t know yet what it will be other than that it is the kingdom of heaven, whatever that is?
Matthew’s Gospel approaches the person of the Good News with parables, the new world that is beginning with the person of Jesus is like….is like this…is like that…is like many things…all of which are surprising.
Like a little mustard seed, which normally grows into a modest sized annual shrub, but for some reason it becomes something so much more, a majestic tree, a home for birds of the air, the branches and the roots are an empire that cover and take over the whole world. The Kingdom of Heaven is like that kind of unexpected out of nowhere surprise, that changes everything.
Like yeast that a woman hides in a tremendous amount of flour, 11 gallons, making bread for more than a hundred people.
From little comes much, not only much, but an overwhelming abundance. It is like pulling off that kind of impossible project, like throwing starfish that have been washed ashore back into the ocean until all the star fish in the world have been saved, or rescuing earth worms from puddles during a heavy rain until all the earth worms have been saved. The kingdom is like that. That is what Jesus brings to the world. A hapless project that somehow is pulled off.
Like treasure hidden in the field that someone stumbles upon unexpected, a treasure so wonderful that they sell everything, engaging in shady real estate deals, in order to just have it. The kingdom of heaven is like that kind of sudden change in direction, like something that catches and holds our attention and adoration.
Like a merchant searching for fine pearls, a treasure hunter if you think about it, who finally finds the great treasure, the one pearl of great price, who sells all he has to have it. The great treasure long looked for that is suddenly found that gladly costs us everything, the Kingdom of heaven is like that kind searching and finding.
Like a giant drag net, that scoops us all up, to sort the good fish from the bad fish, the kingdom of heaven is like that kind of sudden interruption and judgment, the cosmic sifting of our sordid lives, it catches us short, like fish out of water. The Heavenly Kingdom is like that.
How do we speak of this person who is good news? How do we speak of this Kingdom that is erupting from the hidden, the unexpected and the surprising?
We must become students of parables, like scribes trained for the kingdom of heaven.
We must attend to things like bread and wine, mustard seeds and yeast, hidden treasures and pearls of great price, of nets and fish and final things.
We must be students of the parable that is the world, something ordinary and hum drum that is really full of hidden meaning, of treasures both old and new.
It is the great Gospel project that we become students of this Good News, scribes of the kingdom of heaven, disciples of Jesus.
For a season lets join together to study the Gospel, lets study Jesus.
Sign up for the Gospel project, all it really is a chance to study God’s word together so we can listen to how each of us hear it differently, a chance to learn the story a little better and to get know and respect one another a little bit more.
At worst we might learn a few unexpected things.
But it could also be a when we know better personally just why Jesus is Good News to ourselves and to others.
Ultimately the Gospel project is always ongoing, we are always students of the kingdom together. Otherwise Church just becomes tiresome. Has that happened to you? Has Church become tiresome?
The parable of Grace Church.
The kingdom of Heaven is like someone who went to Church, for one reason or another, and ended up falling in love with God and the world God has made, including all these strange different kinds of people.
What a great surprise.
Lets study that.